Dogs of Summer

‘Shows girlhood as it really was: brutal and tender, intimate and lonely, magical and utterly gross’ Anna Beecher

‘Sensual and dirty, absurdist and tragic. Abreu’s talent is thrilling to witness’ Irish Times

Stuck in a working-class neighbourhood, high up among Tenerife’s volcanoes, a ten-year-old girl dreams of hitching a ride to the faraway beach.

Instead she hangs out with her best friend, Isora. She likes everything about Isora. From the colour of her arms and her hair and her eyes to the way she writes the letter g with a huge tail. But she envies her too. Envies her grits and gut; her periods and her pubes; the way she is growing up at full tilt without her.

As the summer goes on and the heat becomes ever more oppressive, friendship simmers into obsession, desire into intimate violence.

‘The sentences blast off the pages. Hilarious, devastating and brilliantly attuned to the erotics of friendship’ Jamel Brinkley

It describes the state of things without beating around the bush giving way to the purest form of tenderness, innocence, and care … It intertwines the feeling of the first love with the pain that comes with growing up — Brenda Navarro, author of Empty Houses
Dogs of Summer weaves a powerful narrative, where bodies and hunger take over the story. It transports us to the threshold of puberty, to face a disturbing procession of fears, euphoria and daily violence. An unsweetened and unprejudiced portrait of poverty. Pure life — Irene Vallejo, author of Papyrus
Shit. My brain just exploded. What a marvel — Marta Orriols
Razor sharp and mesmerizing, Dogs of Summer will thump through your heart and mind. A novel that consumes and sentences to die for — Amina Cain, author of Indelicacy
‘As sultry as the summer weather. Abreu beautifully evokes an era, in which Pokemon and Bratz dolls give way to sexual discovery’ Guardian

Translated by Julia Sanches.

Format: Paperback
Pages: 176
Imprint: Weidenfeld and Nicholson UK
Publication date: 08/06/2023